Author: Irwin Collier

Categories
Curriculum Gender Radcliffe

Radcliffe. Economics Course Offerings, 1906-1910

 

Pre-Radliffe economics course offerings and the Radcliffe courses for  1893-94,  1894-1900 , 1900-1905 have been posted earlier.

____________________________________

1905-1906
ECONOMICS.

Primarily for Undergraduates:—

1. Asst. Professor ANDREW. — Outlines of Economics. — Production, Distribution, Exchange, Industrial Organization, Foreign Trade, Banking, Socialism, and Labor Questions. 3 hours a week.

17 Undergraduates, 3 Special students. Total 20.

 

For Undergraduates and Graduates:—

62. Asst. Professor GAY.— The Economic History of the United States. Half-course. 3 hours a week, 2d half-year.

1 Graduate, 2 Undergraduates. Total 3.

11. Asst. Professor GAY.— The Modern Economic History of Europe.  2 hours a week (and usually a third hour).

3 Graduates. Total 3.

14a1. Professor CARVER.— The Distribution of Wealth. Half-course. 2 hours a week, 1st half-year.

1 Graduate, 3 Undergraduates, 4 Special students. Total 8.

14b2. Professor CARVER.— Methods of Social Reform. — Socialism, Communism, the Single Tax, etc. Half-course. 2 hours a week, 2nd half-year.

3 Graduates, 2 Undergraduates, 4 Special students. Total 9.

 

Primarily for Graduates:—

COURSE OF RESEARCH

20a.  Asst. Professor GAY. — The Expansion of English Trade in the Mediterranean, and the Levant Company.  1 hour a week.

1 Graduate. Total 1.

20.  Professors CARVER and RIPLEY. — Seminary in Economics. Thesis subjects: “The Basis of Taxation” and “The Industrial Education of the Fourteen Year Old Girl.”

1 Graduate (1st half-year only), 1 Special student. Total 2.

 

Source:   Radcliffe College. Report of the President, 1905-06, pp. 44-45.

____________________________________

1906-1907
ECONOMICS.

Primarily for Undergraduates:—

1. Asst. Professors ANDREW and Mr. DAGGETT. — Outlines of Economics. — Production, Distribution, Exchange, Industrial Organization, Foreign Trade, Banking, Socialism, and Labor Questions. 3 hours a week.

25 Undergraduates. Total 25.

 

For Undergraduates and Graduates:—

3. Mr. J. A. FIELD.— Principles of Sociology.—Theories of social progress. 2 hours a week, and a third hour at the pleasure of the instructor.

3 Undergraduates. Total 3.

6a1. Asst. Professor GAY.— European Industry and Commerce in the Nineteenth Century. Half-course. 2 hours a week, and a third hour at the pleasure of the instructor, 1st half-year.

2 Graduates, 6 Undergraduates. Total 8.

6b2. Asst. Professor GAY.— Economic and Financial History of the United States. Half-course. 2 hours a week, and a third hour at the pleasure of the instructor, 1st half-year [sic].

2 Graduates, 3 Undergraduates. Total 5.

20a. Asst. Professor GAY. — (a) Foreign Merchants in England in the Thirteenth and Fourteenth Centuries.  1 Graduate. (b) The Finances of English Boroughs in the Middle Ages.  1 Graduate.

Total 2.

 

Source:   Radcliffe College. Report of the President, 1906-07, p. 46.

____________________________________

1907-1908
ECONOMICS.

Primarily for Undergraduates:—

1. Dr. DAGGETT. — Outlines of Economics. — Production, Distribution, Exchange, Socialism, Railroads, Trusts, Foreign Trade, Banking, and Public Finance.

19 Undergraduates, 2 Special students. Total 21.

 

For Undergraduates and Graduates:—

3. Professor CARVER.— Principles of Sociology.—Theories of social progress. 2hours a week, and a third hour at the pleasure of the instructor.

1 Graduate, 2 Undergraduates. Total 3.

6a1. Professor GAY.— European Industry and Commerce in the Nineteenth Century. Half-course. 2 hours a week, and a third hour at the pleasure of the instructor, 1st half-year.

2 Graduates, 6 Undergraduates. Total 8.

6b2. Professor GAY.— Economic and Financial History of the United States. Half-course. 2 hours a week, and a third hour at the pleasure of the instructor, 2nd half-year.

3 Graduates, 11 Undergraduates, 1 Special student. Total 15.

8b2.  Asst. Professor ANDREW. — Banking and Foreign Exchange.  Half-course. 2 hours a week, and a third hour at the pleasure of the instructor, 2nd half-year.

2 Undergraduates. Total 2.

14b1.  Professor CARVER. — Methods of Social Reform.—Socialism, Communism, the Single Tax, etc.  Half-course. 2 hours a week, 1st half-year.

1 Graduate, 3 Undergraduates. Total 4.

 

Primarily for Graduates:—

101. Professor GAY.— Mediaeval Economic History of Europe. Half-course. 2 hours a week, and a third hour at the pleasure of the instructor, 1st half-year.

3 Graduates. Total 3.

COURSE OF RESEARCH

20a. Professor GAY. — (a) The Florentine Period of Italian Trade in Mediaeval England.  1 Graduate.
(b) The Finances of English Boroughs in the Middle Ages. 1 Graduate.
(c) Ad firmam manors in Domesday. 1 Graduate (2d half year).

1 hour a week each. Total 3.

20.  Professor RIPLEY. — Statistics. Theory, method, and practice. Half-course.

1 Graduate. Total 1.

 

Source:   Radcliffe College. Report of the President, 1907-08, pp. 50-51.

____________________________________

1908-1909
ECONOMICS.

Primarily for Undergraduates:—

1. Dr. DAGGETT. — Outlines of Economics. — Production, Distribution, Exchange, Socialism, Labor, Railroads, Trusts, Foreign Trade, Money, Banking, and Public Finance.

15 Undergraduates. Total 15.

 

For Undergraduates and Graduates:—

3. Professor CARVER.— Principles of Sociology.—Theories of social progress. 2 hours a week, and a third hour at the pleasure of the instructor.

10 Undergraduates, 1 Special student. Total 11.

6a1. Professor GAY.— European Industry and Commerce in the Nineteenth Century. Half-course. 2 hours a week, and a third hour at the pleasure of the instructor, 1st half-year.

4 Graduates, 2 Undergraduates, 1 Special student. Total 7.

6b2. Professor GAY.— Economic and Financial History of the United States. Half-course. 2 hours a week, and a third hour at the pleasure of the instructor, 2nd half-year.

3 Graduates, 3 Undergraduates, 1 Special student. Total 7.

14a1. Professor CARVER. — The Distribution of Wealth.  Half-course.2 hours a week, 1sthalf-year.

2 Graduates, 3 Undergraduates. Total 5.

14b2.  Professor CARVER. — Methods of Social Reform.—Socialism, Communism, the Single Tax, etc.  Half-course. 2 hours a week, 2nd half-year.

2 Graduate, 3 Undergraduates. Total 5.

 

Primarily for Graduates:—

COURSE OF RESEARCH

20a. Professor GAY. — (a) The Finances of English Boroughs in the Middle Ages. 1 Graduate (2nd half-year).
(b) Ad firmam manors in Domesday. 1 Graduate

1 hour a week each. Total 2.

 

Source:   Radcliffe College. Report of the President, 1908-09, pp. 48-49.

 

____________________________________

1909-1910
ECONOMICS.

Primarily for Undergraduates:—

1. Dr. HUSE. — Outlines of Economics. — Production, Distribution, Exchange, Socialism, Labor Problems, Trusts, Money, Banking, and Public Finance.

29 Undergraduates, 9 Special students, 1 Unclassified student. Total 39.

 

For Undergraduates and Graduates:—

3. Professor CARVER.— Principles of Sociology.—Theories of social progress. 2 hours a week, and a third hour at the pleasure of the instructor.

15 Undergraduates, 1 Special student. Total 16.

6a1. Professor GAY.— European Industry and Commerce in the Nineteenth Century. Half-course. 2 hours a week, and a third hour at the pleasure of the instructor, 1st half-year.

2 Undergraduates. Total 2

6b2. Professor GAY.— Economic and Financial History of the United States. Half-course. 2 hours a week, and a third hour at the pleasure of the instructor, 2nd half-year.

9 Undergraduates, 2 Special students. Total 11.

14a1. Professor CARVER. — The Distribution of Wealth.  Half-course. 2 hours a week, 1st half-year.

1 Graduate, 5 Undergraduates, 3 Special students. Total 9.

14b2.  Professor CARVER. — Methods of Social Reform.—Socialism, Communism, the Single Tax, etc.  Half-course. 2 hours a week, 2nd half-year.

8 Undergraduates, 5 Special students. Total 13.

 

Primarily for Graduates:—

COURSE OF RESEARCH

20a. Professor GAY. — The Administration of the Factory Legislation of Massachusetts.

1 Graduate, Total 1.

 

Source:   Radcliffe College. Report of the President, 1909-10, pp. 47-48.

Image Source:   Detroit Publishing Co., Publisher. Radcliffe College, gymnasium & Fay House, Cambridge, Mass. Cambridge Cambridge. Massachusetts United States, 1904. [?] Photograph. https://www.loc.gov/item/2016809164/.

 

Categories
Exam Questions Harvard

Harvard. Exams for History and Literature of Economics. Schumpeter, 1942-48.

 

Joseph Schumpeter offered his graduate course “History and Literature of Economics since 1776” nine times during the period 1940-1949. The core readings were basically unchanged. In an earlier post I provided the reading list  for 1939-40 along with examinations from the 1939-40 and 1940-41 academic years. The reading list, complete with links to every item, for 1948-49 has also been transcribed and posted.

In this post you will find transcriptions of final examination questions for five of the remaining seven years in the series.

_____________

Final Examination, 1941-42
HARVARD UNIVERSITY
ECONOMICS 113b2

One question may be omitted. Arrange your answers in the order of the questions.

  1. Economists of the most varied types have claimed Adam Smith as patron-saint. How would you describe his general method as revealed in the five books of the Wealth of nations?
  2. If you felt called upon to defend Ricardo’s theory of value, how would you do it?
  3. Marx predicted the breakdown of the capitalist system. What was his main line of argument? Do you think that the course of events in the last decade has verified his theory?
  4. Explain the meaning and use of the theorem usually referred to as Say’s Law.
  5. Senior defined cost of production as the sum of labor and abstinence necessary for production. Do you think this satisfactory?
  6. Does Marshall’s work seem to you to close or to begin a period in the history of economic thought?

 

Source:Harvard University Archives. Final Examinations, 1853-2001 (HUC 7000.28) Box 6, Papers Printed for Final Examinations—History, History of Religions, …, Economics, …, Military Science, Naval Science. June 1942.

_____________

Final Examination, 1942-43
HARVARD UNIVERSITY
ECONOMICS 113b2

Answer any four out of the following five questions.

  1. With the possible exception of Darwin’s Origin of Species, no scientific book has ever equaled the success of the Wealth of Nations. How do you account for this success?
  2. Discuss the Malthusian theory of population and describe its role in the classical system of economic theory.
  3. What do you think of the so-called Ricardian theory of rent?
  4. Criticize the following statement made by Adam Smith: “The price of monopoly is upon every occasion the highest which can be got. The natural price, or the price of free competition, on the contrary, is the lowest which can be taken…for any considerable time.”
  5. The founders of the marginal-utility school evidently believed that they had revolutionized economic theory. What warrant was there for this belief? What do you think their contribution consisted in?

 

Source:Harvard University Archives. Final Examinations, 1853-2001 (HUC 7000.28) Box 7, Papers Printed for Final Examinations—History, History of Religions, …, Economics, …, Military Science, Naval Science. May 1943.

_____________

Final Examination, 1943-44
[not (yet) located]

Course not offered 1944-45

_____________

Final Examination, 1945-46
HARVARD UNIVERSITY
ECONOMICS 113b

Two questions may be omitted. Arrange your answers in the order of the questions.

  1. Explain the meaning and use of “Say’s Law.”
  2. Sketch the history and discuss the merits and demerits of the wage-fund theory.
  3. How did Ricardo explain “profits?”
  4. Choose any economist between 1776 and 1890 with whose work you are familiar, and describe the nature, method, and value of his contribution.
  5. Smith no doubt sponsored what Lord Keynes described as the Fallacy of Cheapness and Plenty. What do you think of the proposition involved?
  6. What relation do you conceive to exist between economists’ theoretical explanations of facts and (a) their political preferences in general and (b) the interests of the social classes to which they belong in particular?

 

Source:Harvard University Archives. Final Examinations, 1853-2001 (HUC 7000.28) Box 11, Papers Printed for Final Examinations—History, Government, Economics, …, Military Science, Naval Science. May 1946.

_____________

Final Examination, 1946-47
HARVARD UNIVERSITY
ECONOMICS 113b

One question may be omitted. Arrange your answers in the order of the questions.

  1. Characterize briefly the nature, and the historical roots, of Adam Smith’s performance.
  2. What was the contribution of Ricardo to economics? And what of it may be said to have survived until today?
  3. State and criticize the various explanations that the English classics offered for what they took to be an indubitable tendency in the rate of profits to fall?
  4. Appraise the role, in the history of economic theory, of Malthus’s Law of Population?
  5. Discuss the validity and the importance of the marginal-utility theory of value.
  6. What do you mean by, and what do you think of, Institutionalism?

 

Source:Harvard University Archives. Final Examinations, 1853-2001 (HUC 7000.28) Box 14, Papers Printed for Final Examinations—History, History of Religions, …, Economics, …, Military Science, Naval Science. May 1947.

_____________

Final Examination, 1947-48
HARVARD UNIVERSITY
ECONOMICS 113b

One question may be omitted. Arrange your answers in the order of the questions.

  1. Discuss the nature and importance of Ricardo’s contributions to economic theory.
  2. Discuss the nature and importance of Senior’s contributions to economic theory.
  3. “Demand for commodities is not demand for labor.” Explain and criticize.
  4. State and analyze the Ricardian theory of Rent.
  5. State and analyze Say’s “Law of Markets.”
  6. Most English classics were votaries of Laissez-faire. What qualifications did they admit, particularly with reference to the labor contract?

 

Source:Harvard University Archives. Final Examinations, 1853-2001 (HUC 7000.28) Box 15, Papers Printed for Final Examinations—History, History of Religions, …, Economics, …, Military Science, Naval Science. May 1948.

_____________

Final Examination, 1948-49
[not (yet) located]

_____________

Image Source: Selection from “Joseph A. Schumpeter and other at dinner table, ca. 1945”, Harvard University Archives HUGBS 276.90p (4).

 

Categories
Exam Questions Harvard

Harvard. Exams on Adam Smith, J.S. Mill and Modern Writers. Taussig, 1915, 1916.

 

Frank W. Taussig only offered this intermediate level economic theory course twice. It was sandwiched in between his principles of economics course and the graduate economic theory course.

____________________

Course Description, 1917-18
[Note: the course was not offered, 1917-18]

7a 1hf. Economic Theory [No instructor listed]. Half-course (first half-year). Tu., Th., at 2.30, and (at the pleasure of the instructor) Sat., at 11.

Course 7a undertakes a survey of economic thought from Adam Smith to the present time. Considerable parts of the Wealth of Nations and of J. S. Mill’s Principles of Political Economy will be read, as well as selected passages from the writings of contemporary economists. No theses or other set written work will be required. The course will be conducted chiefly by discussion. It forms an advantageous introduction to Economics 7b [“The Single Tax, Socialism, Anarchism” taught by Professor Thomas N. Carver].
Students who have attained in economics A a grade sufficient for distinction (A or B) are admitted without further inquiry. Others must secure the consent of the instructor.

 

Source:   Division of History, Government, and Economics 1917-18. Official Register of Harvard University. Vol. 14, No. 25 (May 18, 1917) p. 62.

____________________

Course Announcement, 1915-16

[Economics] 7a 1hf. Economic Theory

Adam Smith, J. S. Mill, modern writers. Half-course (first half-year) Tu., Th., at 2.30, and (at the pleasure of the instructor) Sat., at 11. Professor Taussig.

 

Source:Announcement of the Courses of Instruction Offered by the Faculty of Arts and Sciences 1915-16 (2ndedition). Official Register of Harvard University, Vol. 12, No. 1, Part 13 (September 20, 1915), p. 101.

 

Course Enrollment, 1915-16

7a 1hf.Professor Taussig.—Economic Theory.

Total 27: 12 Graduates, 5 Seniors, 5 Juniors, 1 Sophomore, 4 Others.

 

Source:  Harvard University. Report of the President of Harvard College 1915-1916, p. 60.

 

Final Examination 1915-16
ECONOMICS 7a1

Arrange your answers strictly in the order of the questions.

  1. “The wages of the inferior classes of workmen, I have endeavored to show in the first book, are everywhere necessarily regulated by two different circumstances: the demand for labor, and the ordinary or average price for provisions. The demand for labor, according as it happens to be either increasing, stationary, or declining, or to require an increasing, stationary or declining population, regulates the subsistence of the laborer and determines in what degree it shall be either liberal, moderate, or scanty.”
    Explain (1) in what way Adam Smith analyzed the “demand for labor”; (2) the nature of the reasoning which led to his conclusions regarding the influence on wages of increasing or declining national wealth.
  2. Explain in what way J. S. Mill analyzed the demand for labor, and wherein his analysis resembled Adam Smith’s, wherein it differed; and consider whether Mill’s conclusions regarding the influence of increasing national wealth on wages were similar to Adam Smith’s.
  3. Explain:
    1. The Physiocratic notion concerning productive labor;
    2. Adam Smith’s distinction between productive and unproductive labor;
    3. Adam Smith’s doctrine as to the way in which equal capitals employed in agriculture, in manufactures, in wholesale or retail trade, put in motion different quantities of productive labor.
      What reasoning led Adam Smith to arrange industries in the order of productiveness indicated in (c) and what have you to say in comment on it?
  4. Why, according to Adam Smith, is there rent from land used for growing grain? from land used for pasture? from mines?
    What would a writer like Mill say of these doctrines of Adam Smith’s?
  5. How does Mill (following Chalmers) explain the rapid recovery of countries devastated by war? Do you think the explanation sound?
  6. Wherein is Mill’s analysis of the causes of differences in wages similar to Adam Smith’s, wherein different?
  7. What, according to Mill, is the foundation of private property? What corollaries does he draw as regards inheritance and bequest? What is your instructor’s view on the justification of inheritance and bequest?
  8. Explain wherein there are or are not ” human costs ” in the savings of the rich, of the middle classes, and of the poor; and wherein there are or are not” economic costs ” in these several savings.
  9. Hobson says: (a) that” the traditional habits of ostentatious waste and conspicuous leisure . . . induce futile extravagance in expenditure”; (b) that” the very type of this expenditure is a display of fireworks; futility is of its essence”; (c) that “the glory of the successful sportsman is due to the fact that his deeds are futile. And this conspicuous futility is at the root of the matter. The fact that he can give time, energy, and money to sport testifies to his possession of independent means.” Consider what is meant by” futility ” in these passages; and give your own opinion on the significance of “sport.” [J.A. Hobson, Work and Wealth: A Human Valuation, 1914.]
  10. Explain the grounds on which Hobson finds little promise for the future in (a) consumers’ cooperation; (b) producers’ cooperation; (c) syndicalism.

 

Source: Papers Set for Final Examinations on History, History of Religions,…, Economics,…, Fine Arts, Music in Harvard College. June, 1916, pp. 55-56.

____________________

Course Enrollment, 1916-17

7a 1hf.Professor Taussig.—Economic Theory.

Total 31: 2 Graduates, 13 Seniors, 12 Juniors, , 4 Others.

Source:  Harvard University. Report of the President of Harvard College 1916-1917, p. 56.

 

Final Examination 1916-17
ECONOMICS 7a1

Arrange your answers strictly in the order of the questions.

  1. Summarize the order in which Adam Smith arranges the several topics taken up by him in Book I; and explain the circumstances in his life and in the composition of the Wealth of Nations which explain this order.
  2. Wherein is Adam Smith’s discussion of differences of profit similar to Mill’s, wherein dissimilar?
  3. Precisely in what ways was Adam Smith’s doctrine on the rent of mines similar to that of Mill, in what ways dissimilar?
  4. How, according to Adam Smith, does the issue of paper money drive specie out of circulation?
  5. Can J. S. Mill’s doctrines on wages be reconciled with those of his chapter on the future of the laboring classes?
  6. Explain briefly what Wells means by “administrative” socialism; by “constructive” socialism.
  7. “The principle which prompts to save is the desire of bettering our condition, a desire which, though generally calm and dispassionate, comes with us from the womb, and never leaves us till we go into the grave….An augmentation of fortune is the means by which the greater part of men propose and wish to better their condition.” What application does Adam Smith make of this principle as regards the effects of public and of private prodigality and misconduct?
  8. What is said of Adam Smith’s principle (as stated in the preceding question) by Wells? by your instructor?
  9. “The fact must be insisted upon that most of the work of the world and all the good work is done to-day for some other motive than gain; that profit-seeking not only is not the moving power of the world, but that it cannot be, that it runs counter to the doing of effectual work in every department of life.” [H. G. Wells, New Worlds for Old (1913), p. 94]
    “The prosperous merchant of to-day would find himself somewhere high in the hierarchy of the distributing service….And you would get a pretty good salary; modern Socialism does not propose to maintain any dead level to the detriment of able men. Modern socialism has cleared itself of that jealous hatred of prosperity that was once a part of class-war socialism.” [H. G. Wells, New Worlds for Old (1913), p. 304]
    Is there any inconsistency between these two passages?
  10. “Another delusion is that public property is more serviceable than private property, to the public. It is difficult for some people to see that all productive property is serving the public, and the more efficiently it is managed, and the more it is made to produce for the manager, the better it is for the public…The only question is, is it likely to be used as productively in the hands of the individual who has shown the efficiency to accumulate it, as it would be if it were taken out of his hands by the public?”
    1. What parts of this quotation would Wells accept or reject?
    2. What is your own opinion of the quotation, and of Wells’ view on the subject?

 

Source:  Harvard University Archives. Examination Papers, 1917 (HUC 7000.28, vol. 59). Papers Set for Final Examinations on History, History of Religions,…, Economics,…, Fine Arts, Music in Harvard College. June, 1917, pp. 57-58.

Image Source: Frank W. Taussig from Harvard Class Album 1915.

 

Categories
Exam Questions Harvard

Harvard. Final exams for historical sociology. Anderson, 1917-18

 

Exams for the first term of the two term sequence of sociology (“Analytical Sociology) were transcribed for the previous post. 

________________

Course Description 1916-17

[Economics] 18b 2hf. Historical Sociology. Half-course (second half-year). Tu., Th., and (at the pleasure of the instructor) Sat., at 2.30. Asst. Professor Anderson.

            The course will involve a study of the literature of social origins and of later stages of social evolution, with particular emphasis on those parts of social history which contribute most to the explanation of the ethnic composition, institutions, and culture of contemporary society. Instruction will be by discussion, reports, and lectures.

Source:   Division of History, Government, and Economics 1917-18. Official Register of Harvard University. Vol. 14, No. 25 (May 18, 1917) p. 65.

 ________________

Course Enrollment, 1916-17

[Economics] 18b 2hf. Assistant Professor Anderson —Historical Sociology.

Total 9: 6 Graduates, 1 Junior, 2 Others.

Source:Harvard University. Report of the President of Harvard College 1916-17, p. 57.

 

Final Examination, 1916-17
ECONOMICS 18b2

  1. Make a critical bibliography for the special field you studied.
  2. What are the main types of theory concerning the origins of religion?
  3. Summarize Giddings’ “philosophy of history,” and show its relation to the views of Hegel, Comte, and Spencer.
  4. What problems are involved in the relation of the clan to the horde?
  5. Summarize the description of Australian marriage given by Spencer and Gillan, and indicate its bearing on the theory of primitive promiscuity.
  6. What are the main steps in the evolution of law?
  7. What is John Dewey’s view of the mind of the savage? What criticisms does Dewey make of Spencer?
  8. Give an account of the Australian initiation ceremony. What are its social functions? What agencies perform those functions in an American village?

Source:  Harvard University Archives. Examination Papers 1917 (HUC 7000.28, vol. 59). Papers Set for Final Examinations on History, History of Religions,…, Economics,…, Fine Arts, Music in Harvard College. June, 1917,p. 65.

 ________________

 Course Enrollment, 1917-18

[Economics] 18b 2hf. Assistant Professor Anderson —Historical Sociology.

Total 3: 3 Juniors.

Source:Harvard University. Report of the President of Harvard College 1917-18, p. 54.

 

Final Examination, 1917-18
ECONOMICS 18b2

  1. Discuss the relation of the clan and the horde.
  2. Trace the main steps in the evolution of law.
  3. Discuss Spencer’s view of the mind of primitive man.
  4. What reading did you do on the special topic assigned you? Give critical estimates of the different books and articles.
  5. What evidences can be found for a metronymic system preceding the patronymic system among the Jews and the peoples of Western Europe?
  6. What are the main differences in social organization of the metronymic type and the patronymic type?
  7. Describe the Australian initiation ceremony. How many of our modern educational problems find solution in the educational system of the Australians?
  8. Outline the main stages of social evolution as developed by Giddings.

Source:  Harvard University Archives. Examination Papers 1917 (HUC 7000.28, vol. 60). Papers Set for Final Examinations on History, History of Religions,…, Economics,…, Fine Arts, Music in Harvard College. June, 1918, p. 51.

Image Source:  “Alkira-Kiuma Ceremony or the Tossing Ceremony of the Aranda Tribe (1904). At age twelve, the boy’s first initiation ceremony, tossed and caught by various male relatives.” From the webpage:  Australian Aboriginal – Initiation and Mourning Rites of Passage.

Categories
Exam Questions Harvard

Harvard. Final exams for analytical sociology. Anderson, 1916-18

 

This post, besides providing information for a course in the Harvard economics curriculum during the early 20th century, also serves as a gentle reminder just how long academic sociology in the United States was treated as a subfield within the discipline of economics. In 1914-15, Assistant professor Benjamin M. Anderson, Jr. taught the sociology course open to both undergraduate and graduate students normally taught by Thomas Nixon Carver at Harvard (year-end final examination for Economics 8). Other courses taught by Anderson included “Money, Banking and Commercial Crises” and “Single Tax, Socialism, and Anarchism“. 

Exams for the companion course, “Historical Sociology” have been transcribed and can be found in the following post. Incidentally, both of Anderson’s sociology courses were listed as “primarily for graduates” whereas Carver’s Principles of Sociology course (Economics 8) was listed for both undergraduates and graduates.

____________________

Course Description 1916-17

[Economics] 18a 1hf. Analytical Sociology. Half-course (first half-year). Tu., Th., and (at the pleasure of the instructor) Sat., at 2.30. Asst. Professor Anderson.

            The centre of this course will be in the problems of social psychology: the raw stuff of human nature, and its social transformations; imitation, suggestion and mob-mind; the individual and the social mind; social control and the theory of social forces; the relation of intellectual and emotional factors in social life. These problems will be studied in their relations to the whole field of social theory, which will be considered in outline, with some emphasis on the influence of physiographic factors and of heredity. Leading contemporary writers will be studied, and some attention will be given to the history of social theory. Instruction will be by lectures, discussion, and reports.

Source:   Division of History, Government, and Economics 1917-18. Official Register of Harvard University. Vol. 14, No. 25 (May 18, 1917), p. 65.

____________________

Course Enrollment, 1915-16

[Economics] 18a 2hf. Assistant Professor Anderson — Analytical Sociology.

Total 18: 16 Graduates, 2 Seniors.

Source: Harvard University. Report of the President of Harvard College 1915-16, p. 60.

 

Final Examination, 1915-16
ECONOMICS 18a2

  1. What is the bearing of the Mendelian theory on social problems?
  2. What difference does it make for sociology whether or not we accept the doctrine of the inheritance of acquired characters? To what extent, if at all, and in what connections, does Giddings make use of this doctrine? How far, if at all, are his conclusions incompatible with Weismann’s doctrine?
  3. Explain what is meant by the “social mind.” By “social values.”
  4. Summarize the theory of McGee as to the origin of agriculture.
  5. Compare the views of Boas and W. B. Smith as to the comparative rôles of race and environment in the case of the American negro. What is your own view?
  6. What did you get from your reading of Tarde? Of Le Bon? of Ross’ Social Psychology? Let your summaries be brief, but not Vague! Differentiate the books.
  7. Summarize Giddings’ chapter on Demogenic Association.
  8. Illustrate the social transformation of the raw stuff of human nature by the case of either the instinct of workmanship, the sex instinct, or the instinct of flight and hiding.
  9. What reading have you done for this course?

Source: Papers Set for Final Examinations on History, History of Religions,…, Economics,…, Fine Arts, Music in Harvard College. June, 1916, pp. 62-3.

____________________

Course Enrollment, 1916-17

[Economics] 18a 1hf. Assistant Professor Anderson — Analytical Sociology.

Total 7: 3 Graduates, 1 Senior, 1 Junior, 2 Others.

Source: Harvard University. Report of the President of Harvard College 1916-17, p. 57.

 

Final Examination, 1916-17
ECONOMICS 18a1

  1. Contrast the social psychologies of Tarde and Cooley.
  2. Contrast the social psychologies of Le Bon and Cooley.

Answer either 1 or 2, but not both.

  1. State, in a series of propositions, your conclusions as to the influence of the physical environment on social evolution.
  2. What sociological consequences flow from an acceptance of the doctrine of the non-inheritance of acquired characters?
  3. Contrast the views of Giddings and the lecturer as to the nature of sociology.
  4. State and discuss Boas’ position as to the race factor in the negro problem.
  5. Indicate what you have read for this course.
  6. Choose any topic within the scope of this course, and write in your own way about it. (Allow fifty minutes for this.)

Source:  Harvard University Archives. Examination Papers 1917 (HUC 7000.28, vol. 59). Papers Set for Final Examinations on History, History of Religions,…, Economics,…, Fine Arts, Music in Harvard College. June, 1917, p. 64.

____________________

 Course Enrollment, 1917-18

[Economics] 18a 1hf. Assistant Professor Anderson —Analytical Sociology.

Total 4: 2 Graduates, 1 Senior, 1 Junior.

Source:Harvard University. Report of the President of Harvard College 1917-18, p. 54.

 

Final Examination, 1917-18
ECONOMICS 18a1

  1. Explain the contract theory of society. What writers have developed this theory? What doctrines are commonly associated with the contract theory? Criticise this group of ideas.
  2. State and criticize Professor Carver’s theory of progress.
  3. State and criticize the hedonistic theory of progress.
  4. Summarize the discussion in Thomas of the influence of the physiographic environment.
  5. Summarize your reading in Sumner’s Folkways.
  6. Take any topic within the scope of this course, and write in your own way about it. (Allow an hour for this.)

Source:  Harvard University Archives. Examination Papers 1917(HUC 7000.28, vol. 60). Papers Set for Final Examinations on History, History of Religions,…, Economics,…,F ine Arts, Music in Harvard College. June, 1918, p. 51.

Image Source: Benjamin M. Anderson, Jr. in Harvard Class Album 1915.

 

Categories
Economists Harvard Radcliffe Swarthmore

Harvard. Wolfgang Stolper describes his training in letter to Hobart College, 1941

 

This post provides Wolfgang Stolper‘s own description of his academic training, teaching and research interests as of early 1941 in a letter to the President of Hobart College regarding his application for an assistant professorship. Stolper’s Harvard coursework for 1934-37 was transcribed for an earlier post. He was on the job market for the 1941-42 academic year after having taught a wide range of courses at Harvard since completing his Ph.D. in 1938. 

Hobart’s offer ended up being only 73% of the offer he was to receive from  Swarthmore (and which he accepted). From the April 29, 1941 letter from President’s office at Swarthmore:  “I realize that the salary which we are offering you [$3300] is considerably under what you have been receiving this year. It is, however, the equivalent of your combined Harvard and Radcliffe salaries for the past two years…” A follow-up letter from the President of Swarthmore College dated May 7, 1941 confirmed the approval of Stolper’s appointment as Assistant Professor of Economics at Swarthmore for 1941-42 at a salary of $3300 ($900 higher than the Hobart offer).

Also of some interest is the rather casual/modest mention of what ultimately was to become Wolfgang Stolper’s greatest hit: “Right now I am finishing another article on Protection and Real Wages.”

________________

Carbon copy of Wolfgang Stolper’s letter
to President of Hobart College

Wolfgang F. Stolper

19 Ware Street
March 18, 1941

Mr. Brooks Otis
Hobart College
Geneva, N.Y.

 

Dear Mr. Otis,

I am writing this letter to you about my background and training, as you suggested at our meeting on March 17. If you think it desirable either you or I can ask the Harvard appointment office to send you all the documents concerning me.

First about my background. I was born in Vienna in May 1912. There I went to elementary school and through the first three years of high school. We then moved to Berlin where I finished high school (humanistisches Gymnasium) in 1930, and where I also studied law for three semesters. I then went to Bonn, where I studied law and economics in about the same proportions. My economics teachers were Professors Spiethoff, who is now retired, H. v. Beckerath, who is now at Chapel Hill, and Schumpeter who is now in Harvard. From Bonn I went to to Zürich where I wrote a thesis under Professor Eugen Grossmann on the reasons, economic and otherwise, which lead the various nations to defend different economic policies during the World Economic Conference in London in 1933.

In August 1934 I came to Harvard as a Holtzer fellow, and I held a University fellowship during the next year 1935/36. Since 1936 I have been teaching. I took somewhat more than the required eight courses, my main interests within the field of economics being: Theory, Money and Banking, Business Cycles, International Economic Relations, and Building.

In May, 1935 I took my M.A., and in May, 1938 I got my Ph.D.. My thesis was on the British housing boom from 1931-36, and its connection with monetary policy in the widest sense.

My teaching experience has been quite extensive, more so, I believe, than that of most of my colleagues. Besides the usual complement of tutees and the principles course I have been giving half of the lectures in the course on International Economic Relations [Econ 43a,  Report of the President of Harvard College 1938-39, p. 98;  Report of the President of Harvard College 1939-40, p. 99;  Report of the President of Harvard College 1940-41, p. 58,], and I am this year assisting Professors Haberler and Hansen in the course on Business Cycles [Econ 45a, Report of the President of Harvard College 1940-41, p. 58]. In Radcliffe College I am also giving a section of the course on principles, half of the course on International Economic Relations, and also half of the course on Business Cycles [Radcliffe College. Courses of Instruction 1940-41, pp. 43, 45.]. This year I was also asked to give a University Extension course on International Economic Relations [Report of the President of Harvard College 1940-41, p. 347].

The list of my publications does not look too impressive. I have published a number of short book reviews in the American Economic Review, a short theoretical article in the Quarterly Journal. My thesis which I have revised and brought up to date will be published by the Harvard University Press. I also just signed a contract with Blakiston Co. to write a text on International Trade together with my friend, Dr. H.K. Heuser who is Professor at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy. Right now I am finishing another article on Protection and Real Wages.

Perhaps I should add that I am married and have a ten-year old son.

I hope that this information is what you wanted. My teachers and senior colleagues will of course be glad to give you any information about me which you might want. I need hardly add that I am very interested in the position, and that I, therefore, hope very much to hear from you again in the not too distant future.

Yours very sincerely,

________________

Job Offer to Wolfgang Stolper from Hobart College

HOBART COLLEGE
Geneva, New York

April 29, 1941

The President

 

Mr. Wolfgang F. Stolper
19 Ware Street
Cambridge, Massachusetts

 

Dear Mr. Stolper:

I regret to think that more than a month has passed since I talked with you at Cambridge. Doubtless you have gathered that we had entirely lost interest in you in the interim. That is, however, by no means the case. Since we have to appoint three men at this time, a sociologist, a political scientist and an economist we have, necessarily, had to proceed rather slowly. Our major preoccupation so far has not been Economics simply because we have had to concentrate on one thing at a time. We have now, however, reached a point where the Economics appointment is directly concerning us.

I am writing this letter to you to find out more definitely what your expectations would be. The plain fact is that we find that we cannot offer the salary that we should like to. The best thing that we can do for next year in Economics is an Assistant Professorship at twenty-four hundred dollars ($2400.00). I might also add, as I think I said to you personally, that anyone appointed to this position would have considerable freedom in the choice of courses and in the teaching, and a considerable opportunity to influence the operation and planning of the whole Social Science curriculum here in cooperation with his colleagues in Sociology and Political Science,–that is, of course, if he cared to do so.

If it is not too much trouble, would you drop me a line stating whether you would still be interested in the job as outlined above?

Very truly yours,
[signed]
Brooks Otis

BO/bg

________________

Carbon copy of Stolper letter
declining Hobart offer

Wolfgang F. Stolper

19 Ware Street
May 2, 1941

Mr. Brooks Otis
Hobart College
Geneva, N.Y.

 

Dear Mr. Otis,

Thank you very much for your letter of April 29. I regret very much that I have to reject your offer to come to Hobart next year since I have just accepted a position as Assistant Professor at Swarthmore College.

I was very glad to have had a chance of meeting you, and I hope very much that this letter will not be the end of our relationship.

Very truly yours,

 

Source:Duke University. David M. Rubenstein Rare Book & Manuscript Library. Economists’ Papers Archive. Wolfgang F. Stolper Papers, Box 23, Folder “[illegibly marked]”

Image Source: Wolfgang F. Stolper from  John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation (Fellow, 1947).

Categories
Chicago Columbia Economists Gender

Chicago. Ph.D. Alumna, 1927. Mabel Agnes Magee. Professor at Wells College.

 

 

This post provides some biographical material for Mabel Agnes Magee who received her Ph.D. in economics from the University of Chicago in 1927. As I was browsing through Chicago departmental records, I came across her name in a form submitted to hire her as an assistant for three quarters in 1927-28 at a salary of $500. I decided to put on my detective gumshoes and see what I could find about her pre- and post-Chicago life. From at least 1930 (U.S. Census) through her retirement, she taught at the sister college to Cornell, Wells College.  Mabel Magee was born in Massachusetts, did her undergraduate studies at Simmons College, received an M.A. from Columbia University, taught briefly at Wheaton College in Massachusetts, went on Chicago for her Ph.D. in economics. So except for her graduate training at Columbia and Chicago, Mabel Magee spent her academic life entirely in women’s colleges. She is mentioned in Wade L. Thomas’ “A Brief History of the New York State Economics Association” (New York Economic Review, Fall 2011) as the host of meetings at Wells College in May 1948 that constituted the beginning of the “Central New York Economics Conference” that was the predecessor to the New York State Economics Association.

Mabel Magee retired from Wells College to DeBary, Florida, a town just north of Orlando. I have found no indication that she either married or had children. Also, up to now I have not been able to determine when she died. 

__________________

AEA Listing, 1957

MAGEE, Mabel Agnes, Box 469, DeBary, Fla. (1925) Wells Col., prof. emeritus, teach., gov. serv.; b. 1889; B.S., 1912, Simmons Col.; M.A., 1920, Columbia; Ph.D., 1927, Chicago. Fields 14abd, 8, 2b. Doc. dis. Women’s clothing industry of Chicago: study of labor relations. Pub. Trends in location of women’s clothing industry (Univ. of Chicago, 1931); “Constitutional and statutory limitations on local taxation,” 1936, 1938, 1944, “Constitutional and statutory provisions regarding local property taxation,” Tax Systems. Res. Role of federal property its local finance. Dir. Dir. of Amer. Schol.

 

Source: The American Economic Review, Vol. 47, No. 4, Handbook of the American Economic Association (Jul., 1957), p. 186.

__________________

1912 Simmons Yearbook,  Microcosm

[Portrait and signature], 698 Salem Street, South Groveland, Massachusetts. Groveland High School.

Source: Simmons College. Microcosm 1912, p. 66.

__________________

1923 Wheaton College 1923, Nike

Mabel Agnes Magee was listed as instructor in economics and history in the department of economic and sociology at Wheaton College

[Education] B.S. Simmons College; A.M. Columbia University.

[Previous Employment] Registrar’s Assistant, Simmons College; Private Secretary to president of South End National Bank, Boston; Teller at Haverhill National Bank; Private Secretary to William J. Mack, Impartial Chairman and Arbitrator Ladies’ Garment Industry, Cleveland, Ohio.

Source: Wheaton College yearbook Nike 1923  (edited by class of 1924, Wheaton College), p. 16.

__________________

Miscellaneous Facts Drawn from U.S. Census Reports

1900.  Born December 1889.

1910.  Home on Salem Street in Groveland, Massachusetts. Parents: John and Hannah Magee, born in Canada and Massachusetts, respectively. Two brothers: George and Edward L. Magee.

1920.  [same information, without brother George in household, note: last name incorrectly transcribed as “Magie”]

1930. Home on Main Street South in Ledyard, New York. Occupation “Teacher” at Wells College. Head of household: Anne C. Jones (34 yrs). Also residing there: Mariam R. Small (31 yrs), Elisabeth G. Kimball (30 yrs), and Andrew McGardon (47 yrs).

__________________

From other AEA published membership information

1928. Address given at Faculty Exchange, University of Chicago.

1938. Institutional affiliation given as Wells College.

1948. Institutional affiliation given as Wells College.

1966. No longer included in AEA membership directory.

__________________

 Foreign travel

1952. Arrived in New York City from Amsterdam on a KLM flight on August 25.

1961. Arrived in New York City from Paris on Lufthansa 806. U.S. address given as 12 Estiella [sic, Estrella] Road, Debory [sic, DeBary], Florida.

Source:  From ancestry.org’s immigration and emigration data base.

__________________

 

Image Source:  Senior portrait of Mabel Agnes Magee in the Simmons College Yearbook, Microcosm 1912, p. 66.

Categories
Economic History Exam Questions Syllabus Yale

Yale. American Economic History. Topics and final exam. Parker and Joskow, 1972

 

If my extremely fuzzy recollection of the graduate course in American economic history taught at Yale in the spring semester of 1972 by William Parker and Paul Joskow is to be trusted, many if not most of the readings came from these two texts:

  • American Economic Growth: An Economist’s History of the United States, Lance E. Davis, Richard A. Easterlin and William N. Parker (editors). New York: Harper & Row, 1972.
  • Robert W. Fogel and Stanley L. Engerman (eds.). The Reinterpretation of American History. New York: Harper & Row, 1971.

The topical outline and final examination questions for the course are transcribed below. 

One of the graduate students taking the course was the brilliant Willem Buiter who left a deep impression (that was probably reinforced and made permanent by Robert Solow having taught the Cowles Foundation Discussion paper by Tobin and Buiter (1974) to my cohort at M.I.T.). 

Careful readers will note the distinctly Yale custom of not displaying academic rank. We addressed our professors with Mr./Miss/Mrs./Ms. [it was a transition time for gender honorifics].

William Parker had a well-honed wit. His Adam-Smith inspired lyrics to the tune of the evergreen spiritual “Rock of Ages” has been posted earlier here at Economics in the Rear-view Mirror.

________________

Economics 133b—American Economic History
Spring 1972

Mr. Parker
Mr. Joskow

Schedule of Topics

  1. Establishing the National Economy
    1. The colonial economy.
    2. Problems of colonial and early national policy
    3. Regional economies to the Civil War
  2. Natural Sources of National Wealth
    1. Relations between Resources and Technology
    2. Population Growth and Organization of Labor Force
  3. The Process of Extensive Expansion
    1. Westward Movement and Agrarian Expansion
    2. Extension of Transportation and its Effects
  4. The Growth of Manufactures
    1. Expansion and Transformation of Light Industries
    2. Heavy Industry: Shifts in Location and Scale
  5. Economic Organization within the Market Economy
    1. Money, Finance and Controls over Investment
    2. The U.S. in the International Economy
    3. Economic Fluctuations through the Great Depression
  6. Non-market Organization and Controls
    1. Large Organizations in the American Economy
    2. Political Issues and Public Policies

 

Economics 133b
Final Examination
May 17, 1972

Take any three questions including at least one from each Part of the examination.

I.

  1. Trace the major developments in the economic history of one of the three major regions of the United States from 1750 through the 1830’s.
  2. What problems appear in measuring the economic growth of the United States before 1860? Distinguish between problems of source materials and problems of definition and concepts. What do the data most probably show about the growth rate between 1800 and 1850?
  3. The major sources of growth of agricultural productivity are: (1) Westward movement to new lands, (2) regional specialization deriving from market growth and transport improvements, (3) technical change. Discuss the influence of any one of these sources on agricultural productivity in 19thCentury United States.
  4. “Government policy toward the economy before 1860 was not controlled by the philosophical issue of laissez-faire vs. intervention, but by the political issue of federal-state relations.” Discuss with reference to specific policy areas (land policy, banking, tariffs, public works, etc.)
  5. Slavery and cotton go together in the sense that neither could have flourished in the South without the other. Do you agree? Explain.
  6. “The relative scarcity of labor in the American economy in the first half of the 19thCentury gave a labor-saving bias to the technology invented and introduced in that period.
    Analyze and discuss this statement, giving specific examples.

II.

  1. “The efficiency of a monetary and banking system can be judged by several criteria, notably: (1) elimination of the risk of individual losses, (2) variety of monetary and credit instruments available to supply individual preferences with respect to wealth holding, (3) effects on the volume of investment, (4) effects on the trend of prices and the stability of such a trend.
    Evaluate the American monetary and banking institutions with respect to these criteria over some 25-30 period in American history.
  2. What do you consider to be the main factors causing the increase in scale of firm in manufacturing industry between 1840 and 1890?
  3. Describe the major changes in the evolution of the balance of payments of the United States between colonial times and 1929. Do you think that phases in the growth process in the United States can be dated from turning points in the relation of the various items in the balance to one another.
  4. “The railroad is the mother of trusts.” Explain. Is this true for the United States?
  5. “Large organizations developed not just in manufactures, but in all sections of American economic life after 1880. The phenomenon therefore cannot be simply derived from the economies of large scale manufacture and the technological changes which produced them.” Do you agree? Discuss with specific reference to one industry and to one type of non-industrial organization (Labor, government, politics etc.)
  6. Increased government regulation of the economy between 1887 and 1914 was a response to the concerns of progressive elements in the country regarding the increasing concentration of American industry. Discuss the validity of this statement by looking at the causes and effects of several attempts by the federal government to regulate industrial structures or practices.

 

Source:  Irwin Collier, personal papers.

Image Source: Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society, Vol. 151, No. 2, June 2007.

Categories
Chicago Curriculum Iowa Statistics

Chicago. Henry Simons argues for an undergraduate sequence of mathematics/statistics for economists, 1937

 

 

The letter below written by Henry Simons to Henry Schultz in 1937 is evidently a typed copy of what was originally a letter on official University of Chicago stationary. The typed header matches the printed header of University of Chicago stationary and there is no signature at the end.

Simons appears to be seeking Schultz’s support for the introduction of a “Mathematics for Economists” course into the undergraduate economics curriculum as well as for providing different courses for students who intend to go on to more advanced economics training versus the sort of survey courses that would constitute the entirety of the life-time economics education of non-econ-majors. An interesting aside: Simons problematized the lack of analytical preparation displayed by the students coming from Social Services Administration that he saw reducing the standards in the economics courses that they were required by their program to attend.

_____________________________

The University of Chicago
The Department of Economics

Memorandum to Members of the Department from Henry Schultz. July 8, 1937

The attached letter from Mr. Henry C. Simons might very well serve as a basis of discussion. It may be necessary to call a meeting to discuss this question before the quarter is over.

*  * *  *  *  *

THE UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO
Department of Economics

June 4, 1937

Dear Mr. Schultz:

Out at Ames last week I heard about some plans of their economics department which made me very envious. They are getting ready to offer next year a sequence of three courses combining elementary mathematics and statistics; and they expect afterwards to make these courses prerequisites to their advanced (divisional) courses in economics. Moreover, they seem to be facing squarely the task (1) of providing a significant amount of training in the calculus, (2) of eliminating or cutting down those parts of the usual freshman mathematics which are of little use for their students, and (3) of mixing in with the formal mathematics perhaps as much statistics as is covered in a one-Quarter course.

If they carry out these plans, their students will soon be better prepared for substantial economics training than are even those few students here who complete Math. 104, 105, and 106—not to mention those who meet only our minimum requirement of one course in college mathematics. Meantime, nothing is being done to improve our situation here. Mrs. Logdon’s courses were a slight improvement over the old elementary mathematics; but they represent only a small beginning toward what might be done. The 104 course has its merits; but the two following courses, I gather, largely compensate for any departures from tradition which the first course involves. We still have not faced the fact that the traditional freshman mathematics, however suitable for students who will specialize in mathematics or physics, is very ill-suited to the needs of students going into other divisions or of those concluding their formal education at the college level.

I feel that we should face now the responsibility of providing a suitable minimum of training in mathematics, formal and applied, for all students in the College. Nothing can more easily be defended as a part of general education or as intellectual preparation for serious work in the Divisions. The need here might well be met by a three-course sequence of the kind which they are planning at Ames—although I am not competent to prescribe, or disposed to quarrel, about details. There are obvious advantages in mixing a certain amount of applied mathematics with the more formal training; and the fundamentals of statistics can be taught to best advantage only as mathematics and in the atmosphere of mathematics courses. As regards these fundamentals, there is no need for differentiation of courses according to divisions or departments—except possibly in the case of the physical sciences. With appropriate work in the College, divisional statistics courses in the various departments might then achieve their proper emphasis upon special applications in the special fields.

Our own Division probably could not now be induced to impose such a requirement for admission. Some departments would doubtless oppose it vigorously. This situation, however, does not argue against developing in the College the sequence of courses which would be most useful. If the proper courses were available, we could make them prerequisite for divisional work in economics; and, at the least, we could urge the advisers in the College to explain that students coming to us without such preparation would be somewhat handicapped on that account. Some other departments and divisions might go along with us. The Division of Biology certainly should do so; the School of Business and the Law School would probably cooperate eventually; and the School of Social Services Administration needs this sort of thing badly, both to protect their own standards and to guard us against the demoralization of standards which a large influx of their ill-prepared students can produce in the economics courses which they require.

It remains to point out that an important step could be taken now by our own department. Our announcements indicate that “Social Science II or equivalent” is prerequisite for divisional courses in economics. The policy here involved is, I believe, grossly mistaken. Instead of requiring this sequence, we should recommend against it in the case of students preparing for divisional work with us, or, at least, indicate clearly that the existing mathematics sequence is distinctly preferable as preparation. The typical student now gets a survey of social science in the first year, another in the second year, and still another (the five 201 courses) in the first two quarters of the third year. This represents an outrageous squandering of the student’s time, considering the alternatives actually sacrificed. Social Science II has perhaps a proper function; but it is not that of preparing students for divisional work. It may be appropriate to offer such a sequence for students who will enter other divisions and who will have no further work in social science fields. Our own students, however, should be getting more fundamental education—should be taking courses involving the more rigorous intellectual discipline in which their subsequent training will be somewhat  deficient.

If there be disagreement on some of these suggestions, there should be little opposition to my minimum proposal, namely, that Math. 106 be indicated in our announcements as a prerequisite alternative to Social Science II. Frankly, this is what it is in fact now, when I am acting as departmental counselor.

In passing, I will mention another suggestion which I have urged repeatedly in meetings and in memoranda. Something should be done to stop this concentrating of the 201 courses in the first two quarters of the student’s divisional work. These courses should not constitute merely another hurdle which students must get over before they are permitted to concentrate upon departmental courses. They should be spread throughout the last two years, as a continuing correction against narrow departmental specialization in outlook and interest—not studied hastily in a lump and forgotten.

The advisers in the College have finally discovered that Math. 104 is useful for students going into economics. They should all be told now to recommend105 and 106 as well and to suggest that good and serious students should be prepared to take at least some calculus after they leave the College (if not before). It is surprising how many of our seniors now complain bitterly because their College advisers failed to offer such suggestions.

I trust that some of these suggestions will seem to merit discussion.

Sincerely,

Henry C. Simons

 

Source: The University of Chicago Archives. Department of Economics. Records. Box 41, Folder 12.

Image Source: Henry Calvert Simons portrait at the University of Chicago Photographic Archive, apf1-07613, Special Collections Research Center, University of Chicago Library.
Henry Schultz from “[Photograph]: Henry Schultz 1893-1938.” Econometrica 7, no. 2 (1939).

Categories
Exam Questions Harvard

Harvard. Year-end exams. Money, Banking, Commercial Crises. Young, 1921-27

 

Today’s artifacts come from the roaring ’20s. Besides his courses in economic theory, Allyn A. Young taught a year long course at Harvard, “Money, Banking and Commercial Crises”. Before presenting enrollment figures and the exams for Young’s Economics 3, I have assembled a chronology that identifies the course instructors over the entire period 1911-1946. Links are provided to the related artifacts that have been transcribed here at Economics in the Rear-view Mirror. 

The chronology is followed by Young’s course description for 1924-25. Presumably there was a mid-year exam for the course, but these were not included in the printed collection of final course examinations. It is possible that the questions have been limited to the second-semester’s course content. This is something that definitely deserves checking.

___________________

Chronology of the Harvard economics course
“Money, Banking and Commercial Crises”

This two semester course was the product of merging the one semester course “Commercial Crises and Cycles of Trade” (Economics 12) with the two semester sequence “Money” and “Banking and Foreign Exchange” (Economics 8a and 8b, respectively).

The new course “Money, Banking, and Commercial Crises” (Economics 8, then 3, and later 41) was a staple of economics course offerings for the next 35 years.

Economics 8

1911-12 taught by E.E. Day

Economics 3

1912-13, 1913-14 taught by E.E. Day.

Money, Banking, and Commercial Crises (1914-15) taught by Benjamin M. Anderson.

1915-16 taught by Norman John Silberling

Money, Banking, and Commercial Crises (1917-18) taught by Benjamin M. Anderson.

1918-19, 1919-20 taught by A. E. Monroe.

1920-21 through 1926-27 taught by Allyn A. Young. Year-end exams transcribed below.

1927-28 through 1931-32 taught by John H. Williams

1932-33 taught by John H. Williams, Joseph Schumpeter and Lauchlin Currie.

1933-34 [course title: Money, Banking, and Cycles] Seymour Harris

1934-35, 1935-36 taught by John H. Williams and Seymour Harris

Economics 41

1936-37  taught by John H. Williams and Seymour Harris

Money, Banking, and Commercial Crises (1937-38) John H. Williams and Richard V. Gilbert.

1938-39 to 1941-42 taught by John H. Williams and Seymour Harris

1942-43, 1943-44 taught by Alvin Hansen and John H. Williams

1944-45 first semester taught by Schumpeter, second semester by Hansen and Williams

1945-46 Economics 41 morphed back into a two semester course “Money and Banking” taught by John H. Williams with a new one term course “Business Cycles” taught by Alvin Hansen.

________________________

Course Description, 1924-25

[Economics] 3. Money, Banking, and Commercial Crises. Mon., Wed., Fri., at 2. Professor Young.

In this course money and credit will be studied with special reference to the part they play in the present economic system. The principal problems of public policy with respect to the control of money and banking will be discussed. Foreign exchange, organized speculation in its relation to the money market, and the characteristic phenomena of commercial crises will be considered in some detail. The course will be conducted by means of lectures, discussions, frequent short reports or exercises on assigned topics, and (in the second half-year) a thesis based on work in the library. Certain subjects, such as the monetary and banking history of the United States, will be covered almost wholly by assigned reading, tested by written papers.

Source:  Division of History, Government and Economics 1924-25 published in Official Register of Harvard University, Vol. 21, No. 22 (April 30, 1924), p. 67.

_______________________

Enrollment, 1920-21

[Economics] 3. Professor Young —Money, Banking, and Commercial Crises.

Total 148: 6 Graduates, 34 Seniors, 67 Juniors, 26 Sophomores, 3 Freshmen, 30 Others.

Source:  Harvard University. Report of the President of Harvard College 1920-21, p. 19.

 

Year-end examination, 1920-21
HARVARD UNIVERSITY
ECONOMICS 3

  1. What is a dollar?
  2. In what manner and why were bank reserves inelastic under the national banking system? What were the consequences?
  3. Discuss the relation of overproduction to crises, distinguishing carefully different types of overproduction.
  4. Outline the sequence of events in a typical business cycle.
  5. Define: federal reserve bank note, gold-exchange standard, “value of money.”
  6. In what different ways may federal reserve notes be issued?
  7. Explain and discuss the “equation of exchange.”
  8. Describe and explain the dominating position the London money market held before the war.

 

Source:  Harvard University Archives. Examination Papers 1921 (HUC 7000.28, No. 63), Papers Set for Final Examinations [in] History, Church History,…,Economics,…, Fine Arts, Music. June, 1921, p. 56.

________________________

Course announcement, 1921-22

[Economics] 3. Money, Banking, and Commercial Crises

Mon., Wed., Fri., at 1.30. Professor Young.

Source:  Harvard University, Announcement of the Courses of Instruction Offered by the Faculty of Arts and Sciences for the Academic Year, 1921-22 (Third Edition),p. 109.


Year-end examination, 1921-22
HARVARD UNIVERSITY
ECONOMICS 3

  1. Draw up a statement showing the condition of a national bank. Explain the meaning of the various items.
  2. Under what conditions is a large surplus an indication of a bank’s strength? How may it be an indication of weakness?
  3. To what classes of persons are rising prices advantageous? To what classes are they disadvantageous?
  4. Define: gold exchange standard, banker’s acceptance, finance bill, bimetallism, index number.
  5. What do you take to have been the causes of the fall of prices between 1874 and 1896?
  6. Why were “surplus reserves” under the national banking system normally exceedingly small?
  7. State and explain the Ricardian theory of gold movements. Are the recent movements of gold from Europe to the United States explainable by the Ricardian principle?
  8. What relation was there between the Bank Act of 1844 and the controversies of the restriction period?
  9. If the weight of the gold dollar were reduced by half would prices be doubled? Explain your reasoning.
  10. “The bulk of the acceptance business arising out of the foreign trade of the entire world has for many years been conducted in London.” Explain what this statement means and why it is true.

Final. 1922

 

Source:  Harvard University Archives. Examination Papers 1922 (HUC 7000.28, No. 64), Papers Set for Final Examinations[in] History, Church History,…,Economics,…, Social Ethics, Education. June, 1922.

________________________

Enrollment, 1922-23

[Economics] 3. Professor Young—Money, Banking, and Commercial Crises.

Total 129: 6 Graduates, 33 Seniors, 75 Juniors, 11 Sophomores, 1 Freshman, 3 Others.

Source:  Harvard University. Report of the President of Harvard College 1922-23, p. 92.


Year-end examination, 1922-23
HARVARD UNIVERSITY
ECONOMICS 3

  1. Define: money of account, standard of deferred payments, inflation, gold-exchange standard, discounting.
  2. Give an account of the life-history of a typical commercial long bill of exchange, as used in international trade.
  3. Discuss the nature and significance of the par of exchange between two countries when one has a gold standard and the other has (a) a gold standard, (b) a silver standard, (c) inconvertible paper.
  4. Is New York City likely to become the center of the world’s foreign exchange markets? Discuss.
  5. In what ways are federal reserve notes and clearing-house loan certificates alike? In what ways are they unlike?
  6. Professor W. C. Mitchell holds that prosperity breeds a crisis because of (a) the gradual increase in the costs of doing business, and (b) the accumulating tension of the investment and money markets. Explain and discuss.
  7. Was the federal reserve system responsible for the rise of prices between 1917 and 1920 and for the subsequent drop? Discuss.
  8. In what ways do the federal reserve banks effect (a) regional and (b) national clearings?
  9. On what grounds is it generally held that a larger use of bank acceptances in this country is desirable?

Final. 1923.

 

Source:  Harvard University Archives. Examination Papers 1923 (HUC 7000.28, No. 65), Papers Printed for Final Examinations [in] History, History of Religions,…,Economics,…, Social Ethics, Anthropology. June, 1923.

________________________

Enrollment, 1923-24

[Economics] 3. Professor Young—Money, Banking, and Commercial Crises.

Total 119: 2 Graduates, 25 Seniors, 81 Juniors, 5 Sophomores, 1 Freshman, 5 Others.

Source:  Harvard University. Report of the President of Harvard College 1923-24, p. 106.

 

Year-end examination, 1923-24
HARVARD UNIVERSITY
ECONOMICS 3

Answer nine questions.

  1. Explain the first and either the second or the third of these theories of the business cycle: (1) the “banking theory”; (2) Hobson’s theory of over-saving; (3) Fisher’s theory of the lagging adjustment of interest.
  2. “It thus appears that the Bank of England’s official rate is often through long periods a mere empty symbol, leaving no actual relation to the real price of money in London; and only becomes effective, and a factor in the monetary position when…” When?
  3. Draw up a statement showing the principal items which enter into the balance of payments.
  4. What conditions must be fulfilled if New York is to become the center of the world’s foreign exchange markets?
  5. State and discuss the doctrine of purchasing-power parity.
  6. Discuss the open-market operations of the federal reserve banks, with special reference to (a) the provisions of the law, (b) the purposes of such operations, (c) their relation to possible changes in prevalent types of commercial paper.
  7. Why did national bank notes constitute an inelastic currency? in just what manner do federal reserve notes constitute an elastic currency?
  8. Discuss the effect of organized speculation on prices, taking account of the fact that different types of price variations cover different periods of time.
  9. G. Moulton lists as “fallacies,” (1) the notion that a nation’s capacity to pay a foreign debt (such as reparations) is measured by the excess of its annual production over its annual consumption, and (2) the notion that a country can pay such a debt by selling securities to other countries. Do you agree? Explain.
  10. “In the main, banks do not lend their deposits, but rather, by their own extensions of credit, create the deposits.” Explain.

Final. 1924.

 

Source:  Harvard University Archives. Examination Papers 1924 (HUC 7000.28, No. 66), Papers Printed for Final Examinations [in] History, History of Religions,…, Economics,…, Psychology, Social Ethics. June, 1924.

________________________

Enrollment, 1924-25

[Economics] 3. Professor Young—Money, Banking, and Commercial Crises.

Total 111: 1 Graduate, 22 Seniors, 72 Juniors, 12 Sophomores, 1 Freshman, 3 Others.

Source:  Harvard University. Report of the President of Harvard College 1924-25, p. 75.

 

Year-end examination, 1924-25
HARVARD UNIVERSITY
ECONOMICS 3

Answer eight questions.

  1. Some writers hold that business cycles are caused by the expansion and contraction of bank credit. Why and how, in their view, does bank credit expand and contract?
  2. “A country can pay a foreign debt only by exporting more than it imports.” Explain and discuss critically.
  3. What was the major defect of the old national banking system?
  4. Define: rediscount, trust company, par collections, gold standard, purchasing power parity.
  5. “The Bank of England has power to exert a decisive influence over the magnitude of the gold movements to and from England.”—Furniss.
  6. What are the distinguishing characteristics (economic or legal, not physical characteristics) of the following types of money: silver dollars, United States notes, national bank notes, federal reserve notes?
  7. What are the prerequisites to the stabilizing of a depreciated paper currency?
  8. In what measure was the federal reserve system responsible for the rapid rise of prices in 1919 and 1920 and for the subsequent collapse?
  9. The federal reserve banks hold nearly $3,000,000,000 in gold, amounting to about 75 per cent of their liability on account of deposits and note issues combined, and constituting a large idle investment. Under what conditions would a considerable part of this gold be exported to other countries?

Final. 1925.

 

Source:  Harvard University Archives. Examination Papers 1925 (HUC 7000.28, No. 67), Papers Printed for Final Examinations [in] History of Science, History, …, Economics,…, Anthropology, Military Science. June, 1925.

________________________

Enrollment, 1925-26

[Economics] 3. Professor Young—Money, Banking, and Commercial Crises.

Total 110: 31 Seniors, 64 Juniors, 8 Sophomores, 1 Freshman, 6 Others.

Source:  Harvard University. Report of the President of Harvard College 1925-26, p. 77.

 

Year-end examination, 1925-26
HARVARD UNIVERSITY
ECONOMICS 3

Answer eight questions.

  1. Define deposits, discount, monetary standard, bimetallism.
  2. Formulate the “quantity theory” in any way that you prefer, and discuss it critically.
  3. A Brazilian firm draws a 90-day bill upon a London banker on account of a shipment of coffee to Boston.

(1) Why should the London bill be preferred to a bill upon New York or Boston?
(2) What is done with the bill after it reaches London?
(3) How is the bill finally settled?

  1. Some writers hold that when a government issues inconvertible paper money it obtains what is virtually a “forced loan.” Others hold that such an issue is more like taxation. What is your opinion, and why?
  2. Give an account of one of the following:

The socialist theory of crises.
Hobson’s theory of over-saving.
The “banking theory” of crises.

  1. Explain briefly the meaning of any two of the following phrases:

Par-collections controversy.
Open market policy.
Gold settlement fund.
Rediscounting

  1. Compare the Bank of England and either the Bank of France or the Reichsbank with respect to

(a) restrictions on note issue;
(b) discount policy.

  1. Was the federal reserve system responsible for the inflation of 1919-20 and the ensuing collapse? Explain.
  2. Just why, in your opinion, did the mark (or the franc, or the greenback) depreciate?

Final. 1926.

 

Source:  Harvard University Archives. Examination Papers 1926 (HUC 7000.28, No. 68), Papers Printed for Final Examinations [in] History, History of Religions, …, Economics,…, Social Ethics, Military Science. June, 1926.

________________________

Enrollment, 1926-27

[Economics] 3. Professor Young and Mr. Marget.—Money, Banking, and Commercial Crises.

Total 125: 2 Graduates, 27 Seniors, 74 Juniors, 14 Sophomores, 2 Freshmen, 6 Others.

Source:  Harvard University. Report of the President of Harvard College 1926-27, p. 74.

 

Year-end examination, 1926-27
HARVARD UNIVERSITY
ECONOMICS 3

Answer eight questions.

  1. Explain and discuss critically some form of the “banking” or “credit” theory of business cycles.
  2. “If prices are rising” Hawtrey observes, “the mere holding of commodities in stock yields an additional profit over and above the usual dealer’s percentage on the turn-over. If traders are to be deterred from borrowing money to buy commodities, the rate of discount must be high enough to offset the additional profit. But, it may be asked, how is this possible when prices are rising at the rate of 30 per cent per annum?” Hawtrey’s answer? Your own?
  3. Discuss critically either (a) Fisher’s proposals for stabilizing the price level, or (b) proposals for attaining the same end by controlling the supply of bank credit.
  4. Select two of the following and discuss their significance as “causes” of the depreciation of inconvertible paper money: (1) excessive quantity; (2) ultimate redemption uncertain; (3) unbalanced budget; (4) adverse balance of foreign payments; (5) speculation.
  5. Define: rediscounts, purchasing-power parity, invisible exports, monetary standard, par collections.
  6. Compare the note-issue system of the Bank of England (as established by the Act of 1844) with the note-issue system of the federal reserve banks, with particular reference to (a) separation of “banking” and “issue” departments, and (b) the type of assets by which the notes are “covered.”
  7. In what way or ways do purchases and sales of government securities in the New York money market by the federal reserve banks affect the state of that market?
  8. If you were Dictator of France, and took account of considerations of justice as well as of expediency, would you plan to stabilize the franc at its present (gold) value? Or would you plan for a gradual recovery of its pre-war value? Why?
  9. Discuss the relation of international gold movements to changes of (a) relative price levels, (b) relative discount rates.

Final. 1927.

 

Source:  Harvard University Archives. Examination Papers 1927 (HUC 7000.28, No. 69), Papers Printed for Final Examinations [in] History, History of Religions, …, Economics,…, Social Ethics, Military Science. June, 1927.

Image Source: Allyn Young in Harvard Classbook 1925.